A place for a tired old woman to try to figure things out so that the world makes a bit of sense.

Tuesday, August 08, 2006

Federal Bureau of Idiocy...

...and Extortion.

It appears that 9/11 really did change everything, including rules of basic human decency. The latest evidence for how far this nation has devolved was contained in a lengthy article in yesterday's LA Times.

As federal officials took him into custody in December, they told the 24-year-old Moroccan — a permanent resident who had moved to California nine months before the terrorist attacks — that he would be taken to a detention facility in Arizona. He could fight deportation from there, but it would take at least two years, they said. And they assured him he would fail.

Ouassif was scared. He cried. But he was not surprised.

Just three weeks earlier, an FBI agent had laid out a stark choice in a furtive meeting near an East Bay commuter rail station: If Ouassif signed on as an informant in the government's war to root out terrorism, all his problems would disappear. If he declined, Ouassif would almost certainly be deported.

...lawyers and local Islamic leaders in California cite at least a dozen recent cases of clients who were aggressively encouraged to become informants after they were detained for minor visa violations.

"They are trying to cultivate and exploit innocent people, enticing them, bribing them, tricking them in all these ways to snitch and spy," said Shakeel Syed, executive director of the 70-mosque Islamic Shura Council of Southern California. [Emphasis added].

No one would deny that the FBI should be investigating those who would do the country harm, but this kind of forced recruitment for that task smacks of the KGB. No wonder Muslims around the world (and now even in this country) see the Great War on Terra as nothing more than an anti-Islamic Crusade.

I've pretty much stopped reading the LA Times since its make-over to keep the parent corporation happy, but it is nice to see that some real journalism still takes place there. Nicely done. Much more like this and I might be forced to re-subscribe.